USA > Connecticut > Fairfield County > Stratford > A history of the old town of Stratford and the city of Bridgeport, Connecticut > Part 46
USA > Connecticut > Fairfield County > Bridgeport > A history of the old town of Stratford and the city of Bridgeport, Connecticut > Part 46
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No. 52. Rev. Robert Ross was born in America, in 1726, of Irish parents ; was graduated at Princeton College in 1751, receiving his diploma from President Burr, and or- dained pastor of the Stratfield Church, November 28, 1753, and labored as such for more than forty-two years. He was a strong Whig in the Revolution, and when the first military company was raised in 1775 to go to Canada to take Fort St. John's it was mustered in his door yard, where they all kneeled down while he offered prayer, and I believe it to be a fact that all of the company returned in safety, says Esquire Sherman.
He published a sermon, from these words : " And there were great searchings of heart for the divisions of Reuben." He also made a grammar and spelling book for schools.
He was about six feet in height, well-proportioned, and of rather imposing presence. He wore a wig, cocked hat,
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ruffled bosomed shirt, black coat, vest and breeches, with white topped boots, cramped so as to set tight on the instep. As he was once on a journey he got them wet, and, having pulled them off to dry could not get them on again; there- fore he tied them with his mail straps to his saddle, and on his way he met parson Bellamy, when they commenced the old dispute about foreordination and free will.
Parson Ross was of the Old Light party, and was consid- ered orthodox, and parson Bellamy was of the New Light party. "Now," said parson Ross, " You think you can reconcile foreordination with free will?" "Yes." " Well, you can even tell why my boots are tied on behind me?" This he could not do, and in it parson Ross had an illustra- tion, for he believed in election, foreordination and free will, but denied the power of man to reconcile them.
Parson Ross, on a certain occasion preached a sermon before the Association ; and tradition reports that at the close of the sermon he said : " My brethren, we are charged in the text to be wise as the serpent and harmless as the dove, but I think we ought to be cunninger than the serpent, which is the Devil ; we ought to outwit him."
Parson Ross was a slave-holder and owned one African slave by the name of Pedro. He held no slaves after the Revolution.
He resigned his pastorate April 30, 1796, and died August 29, 1799, of a fever, and within twenty-four hours Mrs. Ross died of the same disease, and they were both buried in the same grave. Their only son then living, Merrick Ross, died nine days after, and was buried also in the same grave. He had an elder son who was drowned in his father's well. He also had a daughter Sarah.
No. 53. Benjamin Fayerweather was a farmer, and was the owner of Fayerweather's Island, where Black Rock light house now stands. He had one son, Nathaniel, who married Charity Summers, and they had, James, Daniel, and Polly, who married William Eaton. Nathaniel Fayerweather was taken prisoner by the British on Long Island Sound and confined in prison in what was afterward Dr. Spring's old
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History of Stratford.
Brick Church, which was then in possession of the enemy and was used as a prison. He died of small-pox in this prison. His widow died in this parish aged over 90 years. She was a convert of the Rev. Samuel Blatchford, and was a mother in Israel.
No. 54. First Protestant Episcopal Church in the parish. The Episcopalians in the parish of Stratfield, erected in 1748, a small frame church with a steeple surmounted with a gilt weather-cock; that device being used as emblematical of the crowing of the cock when the Apostle Peter denied his Lord.
Said Church was opened for service in 1749, and called St. John's Church. It was built near Church lane, about a quarter of a mile west of the Pequonnock meeting-house. It was not finished until 1789, when it was consecrated by the Right Rev. Bishop Seabury.
This Church was taken down in the year 1801 and rebuilt at the city of Bridgeport on the corner of State and Broad streets, retaining the same name, and it being the same church that is now, in 1856, under the pastoral care of the Rev. Gurdon S. Coit. The Rev. Philo Shelton was its first pastor, who commenced his labors in 1779, and died in 1825, aged about 70 years.
The principal proprietors in building this Stratfield Church were Col. John Burr, John Holburton, Timothy Wheeler, Joseph Seeley, John Nichols, Richard Hall and Samuel Beardsley. The land on which the Church stood was opened to commons on the east side of Church lane, and con- tained about half an acre.
No. 55. John Holburton, from England, was a farmer. He had children, Thomas, William, and one daughter, who married Capt. Stephen Summers, of Cow Hill. She was the mother of one son, Stephen, who married Betsey Young, and of four daughters,-Charity, who married Capt. Wilson Hawley; Polly, who married Capt. Abijah Hawley ; Grizell, who married Capt. Aaron Hawley, and Ruth, who married Mr. Nathaniel Wade.
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No. 56. Samuel Cable, a cooper by trade and inn- keeper, was a large, strong man and lived to a good old age. He had sons Samuel and William, and daughters Charity and Ann. Samuel Cable, Sen., came here from a place called Compo, near Saugatuck. He married, first, Mary Porter, of Stratford.
No. 57. Sergt. Jabez Summers was a farmer. His children were: Jabez, Jr., and Mary, who married Mr. Seth Sherman ; and Alice, who never married. He was a slave- holder.
No. B. The Parsonage Lot, containing three acres of land at Pequonnock, was given to the Stratfield Society by the wife of the Rev. Robert Ross, for the use and benefit of the pastor for the time being. The deeds are recorded in the Society's book, and in Fairfield and Stratford town records.
No. 58. Abel Lewis was by occupation a cabinet- maker, and was the father of Ichabod Lewis, who removed from the place since the Revolutionary War. There are none of his descendants now living in this parish.
No. 59. Jacob Sterling, an early settler, came from England, and was a ship carpenter. He came to Cape Cod, thence to Haverhill, from which place he fled at the time the Indians massacred most of the inhabitants. He went to Lyme, Conn., and came thence to this parish. My paternal grandmother was his granddaughter and the wife of David Sherman, who was killed by lightning in the old Pequonnock meeting-house in 1771.
Jacob Sterling married Mrs. Hannah (Odell) Seeley, of Fairfield. His descendants are quite numerous. He resided first at Fresh Pond.
No. 60. Abijah Sterling, Esqr., son of Stephen and grandson of Jacob Sterling, No. 59, was a farmer, a public spirited man, for many years a representative to the Gen- eral Assembly, and was a fine looking man,-one of nature's noblemen. He had only a common school education ; was justice of the peace, and general arbitrator and peace maker in the parish. He owned a carriage, called a chaise, in the
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autumn of 1776, it being without a top. He heard that my father, David Sherman and Esquire Sterling, brother of Stephen, then with the Stratfield militia company, under command of Capt. Thaddeus Bennett in the city of New York, were, with many of the company, sick and dying with dysentery, and he went after them with his carriage. He found the two sick in a barn at Harlem, Capt. Bennett hav- ing discharged them so that they might try to get home. He, like the good Samaritan, put them both into his carriage, and then led the horse until they arrived at home, where both recovered.
Lieut. Edward Burroughs of the same company and of this parish, died with the same distemper after he reached home.
No. 61. James Hawley, was a farmer, and a descend- ant of Joseph Hawley, one of the first settlers in the old town plot of Stratford. Stephen Hawley, now living in Bridge- port, is descended from him.
No. 62. Dea. Joseph Booth was a farmer and a lead- ing man in the town and church. He was chosen Deacon of the Stratfield Church in 1733, and died in 1763.
No. 63. Eliphalet Jennings was a farmer at Fresh Pond, and lived on the place now occupied by James Porter. He married Sarah, the only daughter of Parson Ross. They have descendants now (1856), living, namely : Capt. Robert R. Jennings and James Jennings and others, children of said Captain Jennings. These are the only descendants of parson Ross.
No. 64. Deacon Seth Sherman was descended from Lieut. David Sherman, through Elnathan and Ebenezer Sher- man, and conducted a tanning and currying business on these premises. He was Deacon of the Stratfield Congregational Church from 1799 to his death, August 7, 1807. He married Mary, daughter of Jabez Summers. His children were Anson, who married Priscilla Hoyt; Rowland, who died young, and Polly, who married - Southard.
The tanning and currying business was continued here a number of years by Samuel Peet and James French. The
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late John Plumb, E. Allen Parrott, and Thomas Ward, Jr., were among their apprentices. The fine residence now located upon the premises was built by Eli Thompson about 1857.
No. 65. Samuel French was a farmer at Fresh Pond, and lived where the house of Eben French now (1856) stands. He married a daughter of Samuel Sherman, of Old Mill, and is the ancestor of all who bear the name of French in this region of country.
No. 66. Rope Walk of A. & W. Hawley.
No. 67. Benoni French, the son of Samuel French, was a farmer and lived in the house (1856) owned by Henry Olmstead. He had no sons and only one daughter, who mar- ried Freeman Lewis, the father of the late Alanson Lewis, and Mrs. Eliakim Hough.
No. 68. District School House at Fresh Pond.
No. 69. Abijah Beardsley was a farmer and black- smith. He married Drusilla, daughter of Master Wheeler, of Toilsome Hill. She was about 90 years of age when she died. She received a pension for the services of her husband in the Revolution. They had sons Anson, Wheeler and Abijah. Abijah, Jr., when about twenty years of age went as a seaman from Bridgeport in 1805, in a brig commanded by Capt. Samuel Hawley, to Antigua, on which voyage he was taken by an English press-gang and forced on board an Eng- lish man-of-war, where he was put on ship's duty for a cruise for several months, until the man-of-war returned to Antigua.
Through the aid of Sylvanus Sterling and Robert South- worth, who were then doing business there, he was liberated from the man-of-war and sent home in a brig bound for Wash- ington, North Carolina in the month of January, 1806. I was then employed in a schooner belonging to the owner of said brig, of which schooner my brother David Sherman was master. Both vessels being at anchor at Ocracock Bar, we went on board the brig to make the captain a visit. Soon after we got on board the captain said : " I have a country- man of yours on board, I will call him and see if you know
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him." Soon a poor ragged sailor boy came into the cabin, and, although we were intimate with him at home, we could not recognize him because his sufferings had been so great on the brig, they having been on allowance of a potato a day for a number of days. His joy at seeing us was very great, but still greater when we told him we would furnish him suitable clothing and give him a passage to New York. We brought him home, to the great joy of his widowed mother.
Soon after he shipped on board of a schooner belonging to the Prindles of Bridgeport, and sailed for the West Indies, which schooner was lost in a hurricane in 1806, and all on board perished.
No. 70. Jacob Sterling's Shipyard.
No. 71. Charles Burritt, Jr., was a farmer.
No. 72. Joel Parish was a shoemaker. He married a sister of Maj. Aaron Hawley ; had three daughters. One died with consumption, and the others removed to New Jersey.
No. 73. Stephen Burroughs, Esqr., was a farmer, ship-builder, Boston coaster, ship-master, mathematician, as- tronomer, and surveyor-a self-made man. He was about five feet eight inches in height, strong built, was never sick during his long life, a cold water man, and died in 1817, aged 88 years. He was an active Whig in the Revolution, when he raised a militia company called Householders, of which he was chosen captain. He was often chosen representative, and was justice of the peace for many years. He owned the parish grist mill called the Burroughs mill, that stood where the Pequonnock woolen mills now stand.
He was blind for several years before his decease. It is said he invented, about the year 1798, the system of Federal Money as now used in the United States.
His children were, Stephen, Isaac, David, and Abijah, sons, one of which, Abijah, was lost at sea, and David died of a fever caught in Boston, and was buried at Martha's Vine- yard, about the year 1796; and he had three daughters- Eunice, married a Pendleton, of Stratford ; Betsey, married
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Capt. Joseph Sterling Edwards, and Huldah married Joseph Backus, Esqr., of Bridgeport, Conn.
No. 74. Shipyard and store of Stephen Burroughs, well known for many years.
No. 75. Elijah Burritt was a blacksmith, buckskin leather dresser, cooper and farmer, and died at the advanced age of 98 years. He was six feet in height, well made, fine presence, and was never sick until the last year of his life. He had one son, Daniel, and three daughters. His first wife was the daughter of John Hall. He died, Sept. 23, 1841.
It was from him that I derived much of the information relative to the early settlers of this parish.
Mr. Burritt retained his faculties until the year 1840, when he failed slowly until his death. I asked him about a year before his death, if death did not appear to be very near. He replied, "Not any nearer than forty years ago ;" that he had " always felt that he might die any day, but when he came to reflect that he was 97 years of age, his reason and judgment satisfied him that death must be very near.
No. 76. The Burroughs Gristmill of Revolutionary times. This was an old mill site, as seen on page 280 of this book, granted first to the Sherwood family.
No. TY. Josiah Smith was a miller at the Burroughs mill. He had one son, Josiah, and one daughter, Comfort.
No. 78. Philip Nichols, son of Theophilus, was born in January, 1726. Beginning business life for himself about 1747 he had twenty-five years cotemporary with his father, and they seem to have been well and advantageously im- proved, and after his father's decease he continued probably an active business life twenty-five years longer, dying in 1807, in his 82d year.
While his father thought that Newpasture Point would develope into a city and shipping place, Philip inclined to the opinion that the west side of the harbor would first become a city, and therefore made considerable purchases of land where now much of the business portion of the city of Bridgeport
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stands, which investments furnished his children with con siderable valuable property.
His dwelling was at No. 78, on the map at the corner of the roads, and a large portion of his business life was con- nected with the brick store and shipyard near the house on the shore. The shipping trade of Bridgeport was first developed at that place on the Pequonnock river, and after- wards came down gradually to its present localities.
Philip Nichols was a prominent communicant of the Episcopal Church at Stratford. The parish book shows the following record :
" At a parish meeting of Christ Church, Stratford, held Easter Monday, April 20, 1772, it was voted that the pew next to the pulpit be given to Captain Philip Nichols, he building the Christening Pew."
His descendants were prominent in the community and other parts of the country, many years.
No. 79. John Peet appears to have owned this place in 1694, according to the land records, with perhaps a dwelling on it, but considerable portion of Mr. Peet's land at this place was purchased by Richard or Theophilus Nichols, and in the inventory of the latter's estate it is called "Captain Peat's lot ;" twenty-three acres being valued at £126-10.
No. 80. William Pixlee, son of William of Hadley, Massachusetts; was born June 27, 1669 ; came to Stratford when twenty-one years of age and purchased his first land of Abraham Mitchell, three acres, at what is now the southwest- ern corner of Old Mill Green, on the 21st day of April, 1690. He continued to buy land in that vicinity, almost yearly, so that in twelve years he had about fifty acres, besides pieces in other parts of the town. One piece that he purchased, in 1694, adjoining his own land, was bounded "on the south with the trench that dreans the pond, and on the east with the pond." This shows that an effort had been made at that early day, to drain that pond.
William Pixlee married Grace, daughter of David Mitchell, in November, 1701, when he had a good farm and home of his own. He had two sons, Peter and David, the
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latter died in 1742, aged 38 years. Peter occupied the home- stead with his mother as long as she lived, probably, and he, after having been a prominent and influential citizen, died in 1788, aged 85 years.
William Pixlee, the father, died in the early part of the year 1712, the inventory of his property being taken March 17, 1712, to which his widow made oath April 2, 1712.
Peter Pixlee, the son, had a son William who lived on the old homestead, and was the first to receive liberty from the town to build a mill at what is now known as the Berkshire Mills.º He was a prominent business man of the town.
No. 81. Richard Nichols, son of Isaac, Jr., grandson of Isaac, Sen., and great-grandson of Francis Nichols, the first of the name at Stratford, was born at Stratford, Novem- ber 26, 1678, and was twelve years of age when his father died, after which his mother and her three sons removed to, and resided at, Newtown, L. I.
Richard seems to have returned to Stratford about the year 1700, and on June 2, 1702, married Comfort, daughter of Theophilus Sherman.10
Richard Nichols purchased land at Old Mill Green as early as the spring of 1710, and thereafter for several years he purchased land almost yearly in the same vicinity.
A number of settlers had been living at Old Mill from thirty to forty years when Richard Nichols came there, namely: Samuel Sherman, Jr., Benjamin Sherman, John Hurd, John Peet, and Samuel Blakeman's family.
His home was established on what is now the corner of Old Mill Green and East Main street, where he resided until his death in 1756, in his 78th year. Mr. Nichols was a prominent man in the first ecclesiastical society in the town. In the building of the third meeting-house, in 1743, he was one with Captain Robert Walker and David Porter as committee, to secure a committee from the General Court to select the site for that house. He was engaged frequently in the settle- ment of the estates of deceased persons.
9 See page 405 of this book.
10 This relation is proved by a deed in which the fact is stated (see genealogy).
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He was the leading man, apparently, in securing to the public generally the wide street called Old Mill Green, called at that day Pembroke street, and to him and those associated with him in that public enterprise, the people, and especially those of the City of Bridgeport, will ever be grateful.11
In his will, dated September 25, 1755, and proved four- teen days after, he gave his homestead to his son Joseph, con- taining about thirty-five acres, "with buildings, and the re- mainder of my pasture lot nigh to John Hurd's homestead, and all my lot of land at Daniel's Farm, southward of the Park, about twenty-five acres, also the whole of my lot of wood land at Ireland's Brook, about six acres."
He says further : " I give to my son Nathaniel Nichols, one piece of land that I purchased of Jabez Beardslee, lying northward of Totocock (so called) in the bounds of said Strat- ford.
1) Sequestered Land for Pembroke Street.
" Know all men by these presents, that we, Richard Nichols, Nathaniel Sherman, Samuel Judson, Peter Pixlee, Ebenezer Hurd, Theophilus Nichols, Samuel Shearman, Timothy Shearman and Joseph Nichols, all of the town of Stratford in the County of Fairfield, for and in consideration of the love and good will we have for the town of Stratford and the inhabitants thereof, and in order to preserve the common good thereof, said town being the land of our nativity and the inhabitants the first of our acquaintance here on earth, We do give, grant, make over and confirm unto Mr. Benjamin Sherman of the said town of Stratford and to their successors, inhabitants of said town forever, a certain tract of land being and lying in said Stratford township in Pembroke street so called, contain- ing in quantity about six acres of land, little more or less, and it is butted and bounded on all points with common land as may appear by the survey bill thereof on Stratford records, for him the said Benjamin Shearman and the rest of the said inhabitants of the said town of Stratford :- To have and to hold the above de- scribed tract of land to be and lye a perpetual common to and for the use of them their successors throughout all generations to the end of time.
Affirming at the time of this grant we are well seized of the premises and have in ourselves full power to grant the same as in manner above expressed and that our true intent is, the same should be for a common use of all the Inhabitants of the town of Stratford and their successors forever, never to be severed in any manner whatsoever. To confirm all above written promises We have hereunto set our hands and seals this 25th day of November, A. D. 1740 :
" Richard Nichols, Nathaniel Shearman, Samuel Judson, Peter Pixlee, Ebe- nezer Hurd, Theoph Nichols, Samuel Shearman, Timothy Shearman, Joseph Nichols."
Bridgeport. 533
No. 82. John Judson was the owner of this place and perhaps residing on it in 1702, according to a deed re- ceived by William Pixlee and given by Nathaniel Sherman, of the land lying between it and the road on the west side of it.
No. 83. Theophilus Nichols, Esq., son of Richard Nichols, was born, March 31, 1703. He married, January 1723-4, Sarah, daughter of Lt. Ebenezer Curtiss, and settled on the north side of the street nearly opposite his father's residence, where he resided until his decease in 1774. This home was held by the Nichols family until 1807, then by the Judson family of that locality.
His father, doubtless, gave him the land for his home- stead when he was married, and he became a prosperous farmer. He also engaged in ship building and mercantile business to a considerable extent, probably, before as well as after his father's decease in 1756, but in his father's will there is no mention of stores or shipyard. In that will the father gave to Theophilus, with other pieces of land, "one lot in Newpasture Field called Gaspin's Point, about twenty-four acres." In the inventory of the estate of Theophilus, dated May 23, 1774, this property is mentioned, thus: "twelve acres of land on the north end of the point lot £93-10," and "three acres of land in do. with the house, store and wharf, $190." This indicates that within eighteen years he had built the house, store and wharf. at what is now the south end of Pembroke street. In the same inventory is mentioned, "three rods of land and the brick house, and ship- yard adjoining," and "one acre of land adjoining on the south side." This was previously the Sterling shipyard.
This shipyard may have been the property of Theophilus before his father's death. The inventory mentions also, " the one-eighth part of a schooner, the President, $25," and $150 worth of merchandise.
Besides his business life Theophilus Nichols was a public servant and honored citizen. He was a deputy to the Gen- eral Assembly twenty-three years; was a captain of the mili- tia a number of years and a justice of the peace a number of years near the close of his life.
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History of Stratford.
In 1745, at the time of the Great Revival in the Congre- gational Churches, he united with the Episcopal Church, and thereafter rendered great service to that cause. Also, the Probate records of Fairfield show that he was often selected by private individuals and appointed by the Court to the ser- vice of executor and overseer of wills and estates.
He died in 1774, aged 71 years.
No. 84. John Fulsom, son of Samuel, of Stratford, was a blacksmith and carried on his trade a number of years at this place. He died about 1815, and the house becoming old was pulled down.
No. 85. Samuel Sherman, Jr., was the first settler at this place on Old Mill Green, as far as can be ascertained. In 1663, Samuel Sherman, Sen., purchased James Blakeman's half of the mill property at this place, which comprised twenty acres of upland and several acres of meadow, while Samuel Blakeman owned the other half, of an equal number of acres. In 1680, Samuel Sherman, Jr., received this land by gift from his father, but probably had resided on it a number of years before that date, perhaps from 1663.
The highway, now called Pembroke street, began at Mr. Sherman's house, with a gate in the common fence on the south side of the Green. This road after having been used seventy years or more, was re-surveyed in 1749, by Theoph- ilus Nichols and others, as Proprietors' committee, down to the point, and made "full three rods wide."
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